So I have a character concept, but have been struggling with how exactly to make a power idea work. The character is an investigative type, possibly a biologist or chemist by trade with the ability to determine enemy weaknesses given enough information. A crude example would be determining that a vampire has allergies to garlic or sunlight, and then using that knowledge to his advantage. In power terms, I had planned for this character to have a handgun that he makes special ammunition for to take advantages of these weaknesses.

I would assume that it would fall into some kind of blast effect, but I have no idea how to describe the variable nature of the ammunition, and how it would be put into actual practice power-wise. In previous 2e I had looked at somehow making a Nemesis power that required investigation first, but I don't think that works as well as what I am going for, plus most GMs didn't really like the Nemesis power at all (with good reason).

So does anyone have an idea of how to create this power, while allowing for the extra damage that would come from knowing an enemy weakness? Thank you all in advance, and to the moderators, if this isn't the proper place to post a question like this, I apologize, but I was unsure where exactly it would fit best :/

Teafo wrote:The character is an investigative type, possibly a biologist or chemist by trade with the ability to determine enemy weaknesses given enough information. A crude example would be determining that a vampire has allergies to garlic or sunlight, and then using that knowledge to his advantage. In power terms, I had planned for this character to have a handgun that he makes special ammunition for to take advantages of these weaknesses.

You actually don't need a power per se to do what you describe, depending on how quickly you want to be able to change the effect. The Inventor Advantage allows you to design and construct devices for 1p, although they require skill checks and several hours of in-game time. Your PC could just have Inventor, but use skill checks appropriate to your concept (Investigative, Assessment, or an appropriate Expertise for design, and then Technology or Expertise: Gunsmith or something else for construction).

If your PC has a special handgun already and just wants to make specialized ammunition for it, I could see buying the handgun as a Device (Ranged Damage X and some level of Removable) and then using Inventor to add on a Variable Descriptor geared to the target's weakness for 1p, which would take 1hr to design and 4hr to build.

Teafo wrote:So does anyone have an idea of how to create this power, while allowing for the extra damage that would come from knowing an enemy weakness?

It would depend on your GM, but my take would be that the "extra damage for exploiting weakness" is not really part of the weapon but some kind of disadvantage of the target's, essentially taking advantage of an NPC's Complications. A target that is Vulnerable to Fire might take an extra degree of effect from all Fire attacks, so using a 1p Variable Descriptor to make incendiary rounds for your gun would take advantage of that. The balance for this is that you would have to figure out what exactly the weakness is first (which should be a relatively challenging skill check, or possibly even a Skill Challenge), and the inherent limitation of Inventions (ie, they last one scene, which in this case would probably be just running out of ammo).

Alternatively, if you wanted that extra damage to be something beyond Complications, you could just build more using Inventor, although it would raise the difficulty and build time of the ammo. If you had, say, a Ranged Damage 5 handgun and wanted it to 10 Damage vs a particular foe, it should cost 5p (10p for 5 additional ranks of Range Damage, Flawed to affect only your foe or their "type"), and therefore take 5x as long to design and build, which would take a few days. You could also add other traits like Penetrating or Homing or Affects Incorporeal or whatever, but again it would take more time.

A rules-light version that is equally cheap could be 2 ranks Variable Descriptor flat extra stacked on the handgun, with the Slow Flaw on the extra, making it cost 1p. In practice, it would mean you could make the handgun any Descriptor you wanted (limited to a broad descriptor, probably technological) but you would have to define what it was outside of combat time. In other words, once you figured out the weakness, you could go prep your ammo, but if you encountered a foe with a different weakness (or just got it wrong), you wouldn't be able to change in the middle of a fight. Again, you could add on a Flawed extra Damage as well with Slow on it for a few more points.

Finally, if the GM doesn't mind a small Variable Effect, you could have a rank or 2 of Slow Variable for 6-12 points, allowing for 5-10p worth of extra damage and other ammo traits added to you handgun outside of combat time. A little more expensive, but as long as it's not considered abusive, it will do everything you want.

Sorry, I can't hear your argument for realism over the sound of my eye beams.

A lot of this depends on what your GM is willing to let you get away with.

As for finding the weakness of your opponent, the detect sense could be used. Detect (weakness): acute, analytical. Add a 1 point flaw; prolonged study. That will represent the lab work. You could even make the power flawed to needing a hero point so he does not have him use it all the time or better yet take the flaw that will require you to use a skill check and have it be science based. Under his complications you can take a complication where your character needs lab equipment for the power to work.

As for the gun, I'd have to go with blast and the varied descriptor or the 8 point varied power with some flaws for time to change the weapons capabilities and attack forms only added to it.